Communications Director Jobs in Illinois

INTRODUCTION

Welcome to Gallagher - a global community of people who bring bold ideas, deep expertise, and a shared commitment to doing what’s right. We help clients navigate complexity with confidence by empowering businesses, communities, and individuals to thrive. At Gallagher, you’ll find more than a job; you’ll find a culture built on trust, driven by collaboration, and sustained by the belief that we’re better together. Whether you join us in a client-facing role or as part of our brokerage division, our benefits and HR consulting division, or our corporate team, you’ll have the opportunity to grow your career, make an impact, and be part of something bigger. Experience a workplace where you’re encouraged to be yourself, supported to succeed, and inspired to keep learning. That’s what it means to live The Gallagher Way.

Overview

Global Communication Director, Operations, Channels & Performance

At Gallagher, we help our clients face risk with confidence because we believe that when businesses are protected, they are free to grow, lead, and innovate. Across our global organization, communications plays an important role in helping colleagues understand priorities, stay connected to the business and our clients, and act with clarity in moments that matter.

We are looking for a Global Communication Director, Operations, Channels & Performance to help lead the operating backbone of our global communications function. This role will bring together communications operations, channel strategy, editorial rhythm, measurement, and AI enablement to strengthen how we plan, deliver, optimize, and scale communications across the enterprise.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

Communications operations and governance

- Lead the operating model for global communications planning, workflow management, prioritization, and execution.
- Establish and maintain processes, standards, and governance that improve consistency, speed, and quality across communications programs.
- Manage annual and quarterly planning rhythms, editorial calendars, production workflows, intake processes, and communications reviews.
- Partner with communications leaders and key stakeholders to align resources, sequencing, channels, and delivery against enterprise priorities.
- Identify operational bottlenecks and implement solutions that improve efficiency, transparency, and execution at scale.
- Support preparedness for high-impact and time-sensitive communications by strengthening workflows, channel strategy, and performance insights.
- Own the translations strategy, governance, and execution of multilingual communications across the enterprise, ensuring accurate, timely, and consistent translation of content across all global channels and platforms within Gallagher’s communications ecosystem.

Channels strategy and channel performance

- Oversee the strategy, management, and optimization of core internal communications channels, including intranet, email, digital screens, executive cascades, manager channels, and emerging platforms as applicable.
- Define the role of each channel within the broader communications ecosystem to ensure the right message reaches the right audience in the right way.
- Set channel standards and publishing practices that improve usability, consistency, accessibility, and audience experience globally.
- Evaluate channel effectiveness regularly and recommend improvements based on audience needs, business priorities, and performance data.
- Partner with stakeholders to support channel enhancements, integrations, and long-term roadmap planning.
- Establish and maintain enterprise audience definitions, segmentation models, and targeting standards to support more relevant, personalized, and effective communication.

Measurement, analytics, and performance management

- Build and lead a measurement framework for communications that goes beyond outputs to assess reach, engagement, clarity, and business relevance.
- Create dashboards, scorecards, and reporting routines that provide communications leaders and business stakeholders with actionable insights.
- Use data to identify patterns, inform decisions, and continuously improve content, channel mix, timing, and audience targeting.
- Establish benchmarks, KPIs, and performance expectations across major communications programs and channels.
- Translate complex findings into clear recommendations for senior leaders and communications partners.

AI enablement and innovation

- Help shape how AI is applied across the communications function to improve productivity, insight generation, personalization, workflow efficiency, and content development.
- Identify and prioritize practical AI use cases across planning, listening, analytics, drafting, localization, content tagging, search, and channel optimization.
- Partner with communications, technology, legal, compliance, and other key stakeholders.
- Develop standards, guardrails, and best practices for using AI in ways that strengthen quality, accuracy, security, and human judgment.
- Encourage experimentation and continuous learning while ensuring AI supports business outcomes and does not replace sound communications counsel.

Team leadership and cross-functional partnership

- Lead, coach, and develop a high-performing team and/or network of channel, operations, and analytics contributors.
- Act as a trusted advisor to communications leaders on operational discipline, channel effectiveness, and performance improvement.
- Support change management and adoption of new tools, processes, and ways of working across the communications function.

ABOUT YOU

You are a strategic communications professional who knows how to turn complexity into structure, discipline, and results. You are equally comfortable building systems, improving channels, interpreting performance data, and helping teams adopt new tools and capabilities. You bring strong judgment, operational rigor, and a practical mindset about how communications can work smarter and deliver greater impact, while having fun and truly enjoying what you do.

REQUIRED

- Bachelor’s degree in Communications, Journalism, Public Relations, Marketing, Business, or a related field.
- 10+ years of experience in corporate communications, internal communications, communications operations, digital channels, or related fields.
- Demonstrated experience leading communications operations, channel strategy, editorial planning, or performance measurement in a large, matrixed organization.
- Strong understanding of internal and executive communications ecosystems, including channel strategy, audience segmentation, and publishing governance.
- Experience building measurement frameworks, dashboards, reporting, and actionable performance insights.
- Experience leading cross-functional initiatives and influencing stakeholders across functions, regions, and levels of seniority.
- Strong written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to translate complex concepts into clear direction and practical recommendations.
- Experience managing multiple priorities in a fast-paced environment with a high standard for execution.

PREFERRED

- Experience in a global organization with complex stakeholder groups and multiple employee audiences.
- Experience and interest in implementing or scaling AI-enabled workflows, tools, or practices within a communications, marketing, or content environment.
- Familiarity with communications platforms and tools such as intranet platforms, email publishing tools, analytics tools, workflow platforms, and listening/reporting systems.
- Experience supporting change, transformation, or enterprise-wide communications initiatives.
- Experience with global communications, including multilingual audiences.

COMPENSATION AND BENEFITS

We offer a competitive and comprehensive compensation package. The base salary range represents the anticipated low end and high end of the range for this position. The actual compensation will be influenced by a wide range of factors including, but not limited to previous experience, education, pay market/geography, complexity or scope, specialized skill set, lines of business/practice area, supply/demand, and scheduled hours. On top of a competitive salary, great teams and exciting career opportunities, we also offer a wide range of benefits.

Below are the minimum core benefits you’ll get, depending on your job level these benefits may improve:
- Medical/dental/vision plans, which start from day one!
- Life and accident insurance
- 401(K) and Roth options
- Tax-advantaged accounts (HSA, FSA)
- Educational expense reimbursement
- Paid parental leave

Other benefits include:

- Digital mental health services (Talkspace)
- Flexible work hours (availability varies by office and job function)
- Training programs
- Gallagher Thrive program – elevating your health through challenges, workshops and digital fitness programs for your overall wellbeing
- Charitable matching gift program
- And more...

The benefits summary above applies to fulltime positions. If you are not applying for a fulltime position, details about benefits will be provided during the selection process.

WE VALUE INCLUSION AND DIVERSITY

Inclusion and diversity (I&D) is a core part of our business, and it’s embedded into the fabric of our organization. For more than 95 years, Gallagher has led with a commitment to sustainability and to support the communities where we live and work.

Gallagher embraces our employees’ diverse identities, experiences and talents, allowing us to better serve our clients and communities. We see inclusion as a conscious commitment and diversity as a vital strength. By embracing diversity in all its forms, we live out The Gallagher Way to its fullest.

Gallagher believes that all persons are entitled to equal employment opportunity and prohibits any form of discrimination by its managers, employees, vendors or customers based on race, color, religion, creed, gender (including pregnancy status), sexual orientation, gender identity (which includes transgender and other gender non-conforming individuals), gender expression, hair expression, marital status, parental status, age, national origin, ancestry, disability, medical condition, genetic information, veteran or military status, citizenship status, or any other characteristic protected (herein referred to as “protected characteristics”) by applicable federal, state, or local laws.

Equal employment opportunity will be extended in all aspects of the employer-employee relationship, including, but not limited to, recruitment, hiring, training, promotion, transfer, demotion, compensation, benefits, layoff, and termination. In addition, Gallagher will make reasonable accommodations to known physical or mental limitations of an otherwise qualified person with a disability, unless the accommodation would impose an undue hardship on the operation of our business.